The present invention relates to vehicle safety technologies, and particularly to a device attached to a land vehicle that will, upon the vehicle being immersed or submerged in water, sense the unsafe condition and safely float the vehicle. The present invention is suitable for use in any type of land vehicle, particularly sedans, sport utility vehicles, pickups or other trucks, motorcycles or any other motorized vehicles.
Even a small amount of water running under a land vehicle, potentially from a flash flood or an unexpectedly deep stream, may cause the driver to lose control of the vehicle, or overturn or carry away the vehicle. Similar accidents may occur when a land vehicle falls off of a bridge into a river or skids or is driven into a flooded roadside ditch, lake or other body of water.
Prior land vehicle flotation devices have addressed the need to move a stranded vehicle or to create a water transportation device with wheels by inflating a raft underneath the vehicle through a valve connected to a mechanically operated exterior air pressure source. While these devices provide for vehicle flotation, they do not combine multi-function sensor or multiple sensor technology to automatically activate the flotation units, and even where a water sensor is incorporated, they lack substantial protection for the water sensing mechanism through design and/or placement. Under many conditions, reliance solely on an unprotected water sensor, especially one without a method to disable operation, has severe limitations and risks. The sensor could easily malfunction if water reaches it in otherwise safe situations, such as where there is splashing from rain or driving through a puddle or even spray at a carwash. Another solution relies on multiple flotation units that wrap individually around the tires of a land vehicle and are designed for both inflation and deflation. This solution has inherent stabilization risks if even one subsystem fails to deploy in an emergency causing unequal stabilization across the vehicle. Further, if the deflation system of these devices were initiated prior to the land vehicle being returned to safety, both the land vehicle and any occupants are returned to danger.
Therefore, we have developed the present invention, meant to provide a solution to these and similar problems by incorporating the union of different methods of automatic sensing of vehicle or ambient conditions, with rapid and stable deployment, or the union of a single, but well-protected, method of automatic sensing of vehicle or ambient conditions, with rapid and stable deployment. The protected water sensor technology and multi-function sensor and/or multiple sensor technology of the present invention provide a safe and more effective solution for land vehicle water immersion with a low risk of false readings and accidental deployment.